“You did everything you could,” Lysa’s gentle, weak voice said as she wrapped her thin arms around him.
Christian dropped his head against his sister’s shoulder and cried. He felt like that child who’d been locked in a wardrobe and forced to watch his entire world end. Cornered. Powerless. Unable to save the one who mattered most.
“I think you fuckers have seen enough,” Imara shouted through her tears. “Now, get lost before I kill every last one of you.”
The crowd was utterly quiet as their soft footsteps wandered away. Nadine fell to her knees beside Christian and, with blood-streaked hands, touched the space where Gemma had last been, her cries severing Christian’s soul in two.
He lay on the cot in his tent, staring at the canvas ceiling above him. The lamp’s light flickered low, throwing long shadows across the tent walls. His body felt hollow, every limb heavy as stone, every breath a raw scrape against his ribs.
He’d failed her.
Christian flung an arm over his eyes and cried until his ears filled with tears. He’d been tortured by Paulo, hunted on the surface of Reva, and beaten in the ring until he couldn’t see, and yet none of that pain compared to the loss of the woman he loved. The woman who’d softened his heart and saved him from himself.
His body ached from the fight, from grief, from crying, from holding himself rigid. But he still couldn’t bring himself to sleep. Every time he tried, he pictured her laughing in the mess tent when Hawk said something funny or brushing her hair from her face when she was trying to hide a smile. The way she’d frown when she was thinking too hard, or the way her brow creased in concentration like she could carry the weight of the galaxy if she tried hard enough.
He’d hear her whisper his name in the dark.
“I’m so sorry, Gemma,” he whispered into the empty quiet that felt far too vast without Gemma by his side.
The flap of his tent opened, and he cracked open his eyes just enough to see Hawk, Imara, and Lysa step inside.
“We didn’t want you to be alone,” Lysa said as she lay next to him on the cot, just like she had the night their mother died.
The silence pressed heavy.
“You should sleep,” Lysa whispered, voice raw. “Just for a little while.”
He let out a humorless laugh, more a crack in his throat than a sound. “If I close my eyes, I’ll see her. And then I’ll lose her all over again.”
Silence fell again, thick as the canvas walls.
Imara and Hawk sat on the thermal mats, near the foot of his cot, and their quiet breathing was almost oppressive. He wanted to be alone, to curse Illari, to scream and break things and think about walking into the desert until he found Gemma on the other side.
But then Lysa slipped her hand into his, and Imara began to speak.
“I keep thinking about the first time I met her.” Her voice was soft, almost contemplative. “She actually stopped to pick my sorry ass off the ground when we first left Perileos. She took the time to wrap my wrist, risking falling too far behind tomake it to Zion. I thought she was reckless, maybe even stupid.” She snorted, though the sound was twinged with pain. “Fuck, I wouldn’t have stopped to help myself. She earned my respect that day. And stars help me, I wish I’d told her that.”
“I may have only just gotten to know her,” Lysa said, “but I’ve never seen a group as close as you guys. And she wasn’t stupid. I’m sure she knew.”
“Then she knew I loved her too,” Hawk said softly. “Not in the way you did, Christian, of course. But like a sister. I hope she knew.”
The words tore another fissure in Christian’s chest. How was he supposed to move forward after all of this? With Gemma, he’d found so much joy and love only to watch her be ripped away from him in the blink of an eye.
Christian’s throat tightened. He forced a breath past it, tasting salt on his lips. Maybe it was a good thing his friends were here, because he didn’t think he could survive the night knowing that the only heartbeat within these tent walls was his own.
Eventually, his eyes slipped closed against his will, and sleep dragged him under, heavy and merciless.
“Nadine, come quick!”
The shout tore him out of sleep. He jerked upright, lungs dragging in a sharp breath. For one desperate, impossible heartbeat, he thought of Gemma—he had to shield her, get her out of danger before the crowd turned again.
But when he reached for her, it was his sister’s arm he found.
Memory slammed back into him like a hammer, grief rising hot and thick in his throat.
She’s gone.
Some part of him had forgotten, like his body hadn’t caught up to the truth his heart already knew. He couldn’t stop the sob that broke free.
